This study examines how high-level political commitment for sanitation is translated into progressive outcomes through two processes: prioritisation through different layers of government; and course correction to tackle existing and emerging obstacles.

The study seeks to explain the role of incentives in these two processes, and how aspects of the wider context condition the ways in which those incentives play out. It references three case studies: urban sanitation in Indonesia; rural sanitation in Ethiopia; and rural sanitation in India at national level and in the state of Chhattisgarh.